“The Spirit of Frederick Douglass”
Starring Michael Crutcher Sr. of Nicholasville, Kentucky on Stage at the
6th Annual Black and Blue Civil War Living History Program at Historic
Jefferson College - October 26, 2013

Mississippi Commended and
Thanked its Son of the Soil for Historic Forks of the Road
Enslavement Market Site Preservation Work and Interpretation
of Union Army African Descent Soldiers and Civilians Roles
in the Civil War

Adams County Board of Supervisors president Henry Watts,
left, and Natchez Business and Civic League vice-president Jerry
Lyles applaud as Ser Seshs Ab Heter-C.M. Boxley walks to accept
the Willie S. Scott Civic award given by the league during its
annual banquet Friday night.

Celebrate Ten Years of
Network to Freedom Initiatives with Friends of the Network to
Freedom Association in historic Philadelphia!

THE
STRUGGLE FOR HISTORY AND TOURISM DEMOCRACY IN THE DEEP SOUTH (NATCHEZ,
MISSISSIPPI AND CENTRAL LOUISIANA)

In his recently
published book on the treatment of history in Natchez,
Race Against Time: Culture and Separation In
Natchez Since 1930, author Jack Davis correctly concluded
that "each initiative toward making public history more racially
inclusive represents another victory of the African-American experience
and, one might add, a victory for history itself."
He also warns that victory will not come “without a struggle”in the racial battle for public history.

The
Friends-of-the-Forks-of-the-Roads Society, Inc. is pleased to provide
you with an update on our fight for equal history and tourism democracy
in Southwest Mississippi-Central Louisiana. After eight years of
consistent advocacy and Ancestral Kommemoration rituals, on June 26,
2003, one of the two historical enslavement markets sites at the
historical Forks of the Road was finally brought under public domain.
The City of Natchez after relentless agitation from the Friends of the
Forks of the Road succeeded in using $92,806.71 of a $200,000 State of
Mississippi Department of Archives and History grant to purchase 0.388
acres or 16,884 square feet of land at the Forks of the Road. This
particular site contained the older of the two “Negro Mart” shown on an
1853 City of Natchez street engineer hand drawn map. Roughly another
$22,000 of the initial $200,000 Archives and History grant is to be used
for development and erection of an informational broadside display
interpreting a bit of the history pertaining to the long distance
enslavement trafficking that took place at the Forks of the Road. An
estimated $85,000 of the original $200,000 State grant was returned to
the Department of Archives and History by the City of Natchez. A City
that survives on state and federal dollars returned to the sender
$85,000 intended for preservation of African American history at the
Forks of the Road, when there is yet another enslavement market site
just across the street that must be brought into public domain,
preserved and interpreted. Now you understand author Jack Davis
conclusion above regarding our ongoing and intensifying fight for
history and tourism democracy here.

The
Friends-of-the-"Forks-of-the-Road" Society, Inc. now better than
eight-year successful struggle to bring one of the two historical
enslavement market sites
under public domain is a giant-step, catch-up initiative toward
achieving historical-tourism democracy in the Southwest. Although most
of the physical and geographic remains of the enslavement auction
houses, holding pens, and human chattel market buildings in Alabama,
Mississippi, and Louisiana have been lost or destroyed by time,the site and spiritual presence of the historic
Forks-of-the-Roads enslavement market has been located and designated as
one of the most historic places in the lower-Mississippi River Valley.Situated near the Mississippi River at the terminal of the
Natchez Trace and the land/water routes leading to the Southwest, this
site at the Forks-of-the-Roads is an essential part of the collective
story of America's domestic and horrible traffic in human bondage.Most importantly, this site resonates with the presence,
spiritual life, arts, history, legacies, heritage, culture, and humanity
of the hundreds of thousands of enslaved Africans in America that
permeates the landscape, economy, religion, culture, government, social
fabric, and life-worlds of the Deep South. In the Spirits of our Enslaved and
Non-Enslaved Ancestors/Foreparents whose Africanize Spirituality helped
them to endure and survive the dehumanizing processes of plantation
conditioning and enslavement captivity, we say Asante Sana (Thank you
very much) for supporting our struggle for Equal History Kommemoration
in Mississippi-Central Louisiana. Equal History and Tourism Democracy is
the beyond “Civil Rights” Human Rights Fight that is now being waged by
too few African Descendants and others in the Deep South. Because of the
domination of resources, private and public, by European Descendants who
have not or refuse to transcend their Southernism, cultural racial
superiority complexes and lost cause Confederacy, and share those
resources in a fair share and equal history commemoration and tourism
democracy, we seek national and international assistance. We seek your
help so we can preserve, present and interpret the presence,
developmental contributions, spiritual life, arts, history, legacies,
heritage, culture, and humanity of the hundreds of thousands of enslaved
Africans in America who were sold down “ther ribber” to become the
shoulders Deep South African Descendants stand upon today.